What is Aughts Style? How Will They Remember Us?

Style is the way the present distinguishes itself from the past — and the way the past asserts itself to the present. But what has been the aughts in terms of style? Smaller frames in glasses. Shaved heads on bald men (sure I’m tempted). And in the early part of the decade, Van Dyke beards, which are usually (incorrectly) called goatees.

But when I look around, teenagers look to me like it’s still the seventies, and grownups look like it’s still the Nineties.

True, sometimes style is invisible to the eye until years later. I can’t believe the big hair on women in the 1980s, and yet at the time I didn’t notice it. I HAD TEN YEARS TO NOTICE IT AND DIDN’T SEE IT. So there may be things going on now that I’m just not seeing.

Still, I haven’t had to throw away a sports jacket in a long time. I have a black jacket that I stopped wearing because the lapels are too wide — and scream early nineties — but for the last ten years lapel size has been about the same. About four years ago, I took four two-button sports jackets and had them altered to include a third button. I’m not sure what the deal is with buttons on jackets now (two or three?) In any case, it doesn’t feel life and death, the way it did when the 70s gave way to the ’80s.

Back then, in the blink of an eye, everything you had in your closet had to be thrown out. Lapels were huge in 1977 and tiny in 1980. Ties were wide in 1977 and skinny in 1980. To walk around in 1980 with wide lapels and a fat tie was to announce to the world, “Hey world, I got no money, and I got no clue!” But I’ve seen no revolution like that since.

Looking back at the decades, however, I feel the most respect for the ones that asserted themselves in an indelible way: The Seventies. The Twenties. Compared to those two decades, everything that’s happened in fashion for the last 109 years has been pretty tame.

I have a thought about aughts fashion. It tells me something. You know what it tells me? It tells me that the 21st century hasn’t really started yet. We thought it started with 9/11, just as people in the 20th century thought that it had gotten started with the Boxer rebellion, the death of Queen Victoria and McKinley’s assassination. But we know better now: That century didn’t really get under way until World War I. After that, everything fell into place: Fashion, social attitudes, sexual mores, music (no more rolling your R’s when singing), media.

Fashion is telling us that the world has not changed much — not yet. And I have news for you. Unless you’re 10-15 years old right now, that’s good news. Because when it changes, you’re not going to like it. It’s going to change into something you won’t like one bit. That’s how you know it’s real change. Everybody over 15 is revolted by it.